The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) is one of the world's largest exchanges for futures and options. Founded in 1898 to trade butter and eggs, it now lists contracts on interest rates, stock indices, currencies, agricultural goods, energy, metals and cryptocurrencies. Since 2007 it has been part of CME Group, a publicly listed company that also owns the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT), the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) and the Commodity Exchange (COMEX). Most trading now takes place on its electronic platform, Globex.
CME is a designated contract market regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and its clearing arm acts as a central counterparty for trades. In crypto, it became the leading regulated venue for bitcoin futures after launching them in December 2017, and its contracts are widely watched by institutional investors.
Chicago Mercantile Exchange in plain terms
A futures exchange is a marketplace where people agree today on a price for something they will buy or sell later. A farmer worried that wheat prices will fall can lock in a price now; a bakery worried they will rise can do the same from the other side. CME is one of the biggest of these marketplaces, and it has grown from farm products to almost anything with a price, from interest rates to bitcoin.
The exchange also stands in the middle of every deal. Instead of the farmer having to trust the bakery, both deal with CME's clearing house, which collects deposits from each side and makes sure whoever wins gets paid. That guarantee is a big reason large investors and banks are willing to trade there.
History
The exchange began in 1898 as the Chicago Butter and Egg Board and took the name Chicago Mercantile Exchange in 1919. For decades it traded farm products such as eggs, onions, pork bellies and cattle. In 1972, under the leadership of Leo Melamed, it launched currency futures through a new division, the International Monetary Market, soon after the end of the Bretton Woods system of fixed exchange rates. This began the shift towards financial futures: it introduced Eurodollar futures in 1981, the first major cash-settled futures contract, and S&P 500 index futures in 1982. Globex launched in 1992. CME became a for-profit company in 2000, went public in 2002, merged with the CBOT in 2007 and bought NYMEX in 2008.
Products and clearing
CME Group's main product areas include:
- Interest rates. Futures on US Treasuries and on SOFR, which replaced Eurodollar futures as the main short-term rate contract in 2023.
- Equity indices. Futures and options on the S&P 500, Nasdaq-100, Dow Jones and other indices, including smaller "micro" contracts.
- Foreign exchange. Currency futures and options on major and emerging-market currencies.
- Commodities. Agricultural, energy and metals contracts traded through CBOT, NYMEX and COMEX.
- Cryptocurrencies. Futures and options on bitcoin and ether, with later additions for other tokens.
CME Clearing collects initial and variation margin from clearing members and maintains guarantee funds to absorb a member's default, a structure that has made it one of the most important financial market utilities in the United States.
Crypto futures
CME launched cash-settled bitcoin futures in December 2017, a week after the rival Cboe Futures Exchange. Each contract represents 5 bitcoin and settles against the CME CF Bitcoin Reference Rate, an index built from prices on several spot exchanges, so no bitcoin changes hands. Ether futures followed in February 2021, and smaller micro contracts for both were added later. In 2025, CME added futures on Solana and XRP. CME's bitcoin futures were central to US regulators' later approval of spot bitcoin ETFs, since the exchange's surveillance of its regulated market was cited as protection against manipulation. Traders also watch the "CME gap", the price difference between Friday's close and Monday's open, because CME crypto futures do not trade continuously like spot markets.
Criticism and issues
Like other large exchanges, CME has faced criticism over market concentration, fees and the high cost of data. Its role in setting benchmark prices has drawn scrutiny during market stress, such as the April 2020 episode when the May contract for West Texas Intermediate crude oil settled below zero. Some crypto advocates argue that cash-settled futures let large traders bet on prices without holding the underlying asset, though the evidence on their price effects is mixed. The exchange's overall role is described further under Derivatives Market and Commodities Market.